Summer Workforce Planning for WA Childcare and Healthcare

A summer roster can look settled until you ask who will take a call from a family, follow up an outstanding referral or show a relief worker where to find the information they need. Those responsibilities can be easy to miss when the focus is on covering shifts.

For healthcare and childcare employers in Western Australia, a useful summer review starts with four questions. Who is taking leave? What do people covering need to know? What work needs a handover? And who should hear about a change before it happens?

Look at what goes on leave with each person

Start with approved leave, then look at where absences overlap. Pay particular attention to duties that usually sit with one person, such as checking a shared inbox, confirming changes to visits or following up with families. Name who will take each duty and check that they have the time, access and authority to carry it out.

In a regional service, it may also be worth checking what your backup arrangement means in practice. If the person covering is already working in another town that day, agree on what they can handle by phone and who can help on site if needed.

Give relief staff a practical induction

Someone can be experienced in their role and still be unfamiliar with your service. Before their first shift, show them where to find current information, who can answer questions and how to raise a concern. Walk through a situation they might face on the day so they can see how those arrangements work.

In a community health team, that might mean showing a covering colleague where to find the latest visit notes and who to call if a visit needs to change. In childcare, it might mean introducing a relief educator to the room team and talking through the routines that help particular children settle.

Make each handover clear about what happens next

A useful handover gives the person receiving it enough information to act. For each open item, record what has happened, what needs to happen next, when it is due and who owns it. Keep the handover in the place your team already uses for that work, with access limited to the people who need it.

Imagine a Perth early learning service where a familiar educator is about to take leave. A parent has asked for a call after their child’s first morning in a new room. The room roster is covered, but the promise was made during a conversation at pick up. A brief handover can carry that promise through by naming who will call, when the family can expect to hear and what the parent wanted the team to look out for. For the family, that follow through is part of feeling known by the service.

Tell people about changes they need to plan around

Agree who will update staff, families or clients when a contact person, opening time or appointment changes. Give people enough notice to adjust their plans, and make sure the same information reaches whoever answers the phone or checks the inbox. If arrangements change again, one named person can make sure the update reaches everyone affected.

Before the first busy week, choose one day when several people are away and walk through it with the staff who will be there. Ask who will pick up an unfinished task, how a relief colleague will find help and what a family or client will be told if plans change. Wherever the answer depends on someone remembering to mention it, you have a practical place to start.

If you’d like to talk through your summer staffing plans for a WA healthcare or childcare service, get in touch with the BB Recruitment team.

📧 enquiries@bbrecruitment.com.au
📞 08 6216 0014
🌐 linktr.ee/bbrecruitment